Knead all the ingredients into a dought and shape it like a ball. Let this ball rest in a cool place for an hour, for example in the fridge.

Preheat the oven at 160 degrees Celsius o2 320 degrees Fahrenheit. Butter the baking sheet. Make little balls out of half of the dough, the balls should have the size of a marble. Put the little balls on the baking sheet, equally spaced from each other. Half the ball should fill an entire baking sheet with pepernoten.

Push every little ball down just a bit. Put the baking sheet in the middle of the oven and bake the pepernoten untill they are ready and goldenbrown, this will take about 20 minutes. Let the pepernoten cool. While the first batch of pepernoten is baking, you can make the second batch.

donderdag 27 november 2008

Thanksgiving has arrived..... So ofcourse Vibi of La Casserole Carée had no choice but to choose Thanksgiving Twofer Pie! Normally we post on Tuesdays, hence the name Tuesdays with Dorie.

Since this pie is a very good pie for Thanksgiving (you probably figured that out when you read the name....) our fearless leader of TWD L W allowed us to post this recipe late, but it should be posted by the 30th of November. Not wanting to break with traditions (even though they are not mine) I decided that since this is a Thanksgiving Pie I would bake it on Thanksgiving.

This pie actually consists of two pies: a pumpkin pie and a pecan pie. First you bake a single crust pie, than you pour the pumpkin filling on top of the crust. Sprinkle the pecans on top and pour the pecan filling over it. And into the oven.....

Once again there are heavenly smells emurging from the kitchen while the oven is doing its job.... When the pie came out off the oven I actually had to restrain myself from taking a piece of the pie immediately. I managed to practice my patience for 30 minutes....

When I scooped one piece out of the pie-shape, some kind of fluid came oozing out of the pie into the empty spot where that piece of pie used to be.... Maybe it should have stayed into the oven a bit longer?? I had already had it in there for 55 minutes.... The piece looks like a bit of a mess.....

As for the taste.... YUMMY!!! I love this pie!! Give me more..... O no, I can't.... I promissed to bring the pie to work tomorrow...... It's nice, sweet, creamy and smooth, maybe a bit too soft. But still: delicious!!!

My everlasting gratitude goes out to Vibi for picking this great recipe!! If you want to check out what the other TWD-ers baked up, click here.....

This week it was up to MrsBethorama of Supplicious to pick the recipe for CEiMB. She choose Macaroni and Four Cheeses. The recipe can be found here.

Since I never had real Macaroni and Cheese, except from Krafts' one time, I didn't quite know what to expect. Since I live in Holland and thus didn't have all the right cheeses at hand I had to make some cheese-changes, I used Farmer Cheddar instead of extra-sharp cheddar and Manchego instead of Monterey Jack (The local cheeseshop-owner adviced me on the cheeses).

I halved the recipe and decided to make it Wednesday since my friend would come over and have dinner with me before we went to Ladies Night at the cinema (we saw The Women). Although I did like the Mac & 4 Cheeses, I did find it a bit bland. Next time I will use either a bit more cayennepepper or a stronger cheese like gorgonzola. But I will be making this again: to me it''s one of those comforting, wintery dishes!

maandag 24 november 2008

So today Peggy of Pantry Revisited, one of my favourite blogs, gave me a beautiful award: the Butterfly Award! Thank you so much Peggy!!

Ofcourse there are some rules attached to this award:1. Pick ten people to pass this onto.2. Contact them and let them know you have chosen them for this award.3. Also, link back to the person who gave you the award."

Again it was very difficult to pick ten people out of all the blogs that I read, there are so many talented people out there!! So here are my ten nominees ;)

donderdag 20 november 2008

You may think: Winners??? I thougth there was one giveaway??? Totally true, but being the generous person I am (if I say so myself) I decided to also give one person a chance to sample the chocolate letter and send some pepernoten to another person. Ain't I sweet??? :)

To be completely clear:

The winner gets the chocoladeletter of her choice, the pepernoten and something else

So, the winner of the 'big giveaway' is MacDuff!!! No need to move: the Sinterklaas-goodies will come your way, but please tell me which letter you want to receive.... Clara is the lucky winner of a chocolate letter "C" and Kristin will receive some pepernoten. Congratulations to the three of you!!!

It's Ellie-time again!! This means another great (and light) recipe to try. MacDuff of Lonely Sidecar choose Oven Fried Chicken, the recipe can be found here. I had planned on making this recipe during the weekend, but somehow my schedule got turned upside down and I didn't make it untill tonight. It's been a busy week!!!

I was somewhat afraid that I had to skip another CEiMB, because I was supposed to be going out for dinner tonight with a former co-worker. But unfortunately she was sick so I had to eat in, which was fortunate because now I had the chance to make the Oven Fried Chicken!!

I thought I still had chickenfilets, but they had gone bad. So out of the corner of my freezer came some chicken strips. I added a little bit of tabasco to the yoghurtdip and used a little less cayennepepper in the crustdip. I halved the entire recipe so I would have three servings, but when I had dipped 2/3 of the chicken into the crustdip I had no more crustdip leftover.... So I popped the rest of the chicken back into the fridge.

I served the chicken with a vegetable stir-fry and some baked potatoes. Man, this was soooooo delicious!! The crust was nice and crunchy plus spicy, but the chicken inside was still quite moist and fully cooked. (I hate semi-cooked chicken....). I loved it and will definetely be making it again. MacDuff, thank you so much for picking this recipe!!

You should check out our site, it has had a makeover thanks to the very creative Leanne of Enjoying My Favourite Things who designed the badge above and the very talented Holly of Phemomenon who designed the new header and the badge below. Thanks girls!!

woensdag 19 november 2008

I know.... I'm a day late posting this, but well.... You're just going to have to forgive me!

Isabelle from Les gourmandises d'Isa hosted TWD this week and picked Arborio Rice Pudding as the recipe for this week. But.... I don't like rice pudding (sorry Isa... :( ) and was also put off by the P&Q's: lots of people seemed to have issues in one way or the other with this recipe. If you would like to try and make it, the recipe can be found here. The results of the other TWD-ers can be found here.

So you may wonder: what did I do if I didn't make the rice pudding? I decided to do a rewind and make the Brioche Raisin Snails: they were picked by Peabody of Culinary Concoctions of Peabody for March 18, 2008. Since I wasn't a member of TWD back then I haven't made these before and had my eye on them since I joined. I will not type over the entire recipe as it can be found here.

The recipe called for 2 packets of dry-active yeast. I had no idea how much grams or teaspoons that would be, but luckily someone asked that question in the P&Q. Thus I found out that 1 packet is 2 1/4 tsp. Instead of the rum called for in this recipe (Peabody used Grand Marnier) I used a cinnamon liquor and I made a plaine glaze instead of Peabody's tangerine glaze. Other than that I followed the recipe exactly.

I loved these!! I will defenitely be making them again, but next time I will pop the in the oven just a bit shorter: I thought they were a bit too brown and prefer them to be more golden and soft.

As for the other half of the dough: I'm keeping that to make the Pecan Honey Sticky buns that were chosen by Madam Chow of Madam Chow's Kitchen for TWD for May 27, 2008. They will be appearing on this blog soon. ;)

P.S. Don't forget to sign up for my first blog give-away!! Deadline is tonight: midnight European time. Sign-up here!!

So today I felt like making an old time favourite dish. I've been making this for years now and still love it but somehow haven't made it the last couple of months. This dish can easily be prepared and popped into the fridge before baking when you know you have a busy day the next day, that's how I normally make it!

Leek and Sausage Meat Ovendish (serves 2)

250 grams ground beef (also known as hamburger or sausage meat)

300 grams leek, julliened

300 grams mashed potatoes (cold)

2 medium bananas, sliced

1 tsp curry powder

1/4 cup water

100 grams grated cheese

Start by browning the ground beef in a pan without or with very little butter: the meat contains enough fat on it's own. Add salt and pepper to taste. Divide the meat evenly over the bottom of the ovendish.

Then stew the leek in the fat of the beef, add the curry powder and the water. Add salt and pepper to taste. Stew untill all the water has evaporated.Distribute the leek evenly over the ground beef in the ovendish.

Top the leek with the sliced bananas.

Divide the cold mashed potatoes over the leek and sprinkle the cheese on top.

Pop into a preheated oven at 375 degrees Fahrenheit for 45 minutes.

Enjoy!!

P.S. Don't forget to sign up for my first blog give-away!! Deadline is tonight: midnight European time. Sign-up here!!

dinsdag 18 november 2008

I haven't made the rice pudding... I don't like rice pudding.... :(So I decided to do a rewind and make the raisin snails. I will be posting about them tomorrow, having some trouble with my PC at home. But meanwhile don't forget about my giveaway: deadline is the 20th of November!!

zaterdag 15 november 2008

Guess what..... It's time for my first give-away. Why??? Because Sinterklaas arrived in Holland today: exactly 3 weeks before it's his birthday: the 5th of December. I'm always a giving person, but around Sinterklaas and Christmas I tend to be even more generous.

First let me explain you a little bit about Sinterklaas (info from The Holland Ring, adapted by me):

The Feast of Sinterklaas is an annual event which has been uniquely Dutch and Flemish for centuries. It is is celebrated nationwide on the 5th of December by young and old, christian and non-christian, and without any religious overtones.

Sinterklaas is a kind of benevolent old man, whose feast day is observed by exchanging gifts and making good-natured fun of each other. It so happens that the legend of St. Nicholas is based on historical fact. He did actually exist. He lived from 271 A.D. to December 6th, 342 or 343. His 4th century tomb in the town of Myra, near the city of Anatolia in present-day Turkey, has even been dug up by archaeologists.

This is his story: Born of a wealthy family, Nicholas was brought up as a devout Christian. When his parents died of an epidemic, he distributed his wealth among the poor and became a priest.Later he became Archbishop of Myra, and it is from here that the fame of his good deeds began to spread across the Mediterranean.

All Dutch children know that Sinterklaas (the name is a corruption of Sint Nikolaas) lives in Spain. Exactly why he does remains a mystery, but that is what all the old songs and nursery rhymes say. Whatever the case may be, in Spain he spends most of the year recording the behaviour of all children in a big red book, while his helper Black Peter (Zwarte Piet) stocks up on presents for next December 5th.

In the first weeks of November, Sinterklaas gets on his white horse, Peter ("Piet") swings a huge sack full of gifts over his shoulder, and the three of them board a steamship headed for the Netherlands. Around mid-November they arrive in a harbour town - a different one every year - where they are formally greeted by the Mayor and a delegation of citizens. Their parade through town is watched live on television by the whole country and marks the beginning of the "Sinterklaas season".

The old bishop and his helpmate are suddenly everywhere at once. At night they ride across Holland's' rooftops and Sinterklaas listens through the chimneys to check on the children's behaviour. Piet jumps down the chimney flues and makes sure that the carrot or hay the children have left for the horse in their shoes by the fireplace is exchanged for a small gift or some candy. During the day, Sinterklaas and Piet are even busier, visiting schools, hospitals, department stores, restaurants, offices and many private homes. Piet rings doorbells, scatters sweets through the slightly opened doors and leaves basketfuls of presents by the front door.

How do they manage to be all over the Netherlands at once? This is thanks to the so-called "hulp-Sinterklazen", or Sinterklaas helpers, who dress up like the bishop and Black Peter and help them perform their duties. Children who become wise to these simultaneous "Sint-sightings" are told that since Sinterklaas cannot indeed be in two places at once, he gets a little help from his uncanonized friends.

The Dutch are busy too - shopping for, and more importantly, making presents. Tradition demands that all packages be camouflaged in some imaginative way, and that every gift be accompanied by a fitting poem.

This is the essence of Sinterklaas: lots of fun on a day when people are not only allowed, but expected, to make fun of each other in a friendly way. Children, parents, teachers, employers and employees, friends and co-workers tease each other and make fun of each others' habits and mannerisms. Another part of the fun is how presents are hidden or disguised. Recipients often have to go on a treasure hunt all over the house, aided by hints, to look for them. They must be prepared to dig their gifts out of the potato bin, to find them in a jello pudding, in a glove filled with wet sand, in some crazy dummy or doll. Working hard for your presents and working even harder to think up other peoples' presents and get them ready is what the fun is all about.

The original poem accompanying each present is another old custom and a particularly challenging one. Here the author has a field day with his subject (the recipient of the gift). Foibles, love interests, embarrassing incidents, funny habits and well-kept secrets are all fair game. The recipient, who is the butt of the joke, has to open his/her package in public and read the poem aloud amid general hilarity. The real giver is supposed to remain anonymous because all presents technically come from Sinterklaas, and recipients say out loud "Thank you, Sinterklaas!", even if they no longer believe in him.

On the day of the 5th, most places of business close a bit earlier than normal. The Dutch head home to a table laden with the same traditional sweets and baked goods eaten for St. Nicholas as shown in the 17th-century paintings of the Old Masters. The emphasis is on originality and personal effort rather than the commercial value of the gift, which is one reason why Sinterklaas is such a delightful event for young and old alike.

It were the Dutch settlers who brought St. Nicholas over to New Amsterdam - USA. So it could be a possiblity that America actually owes the cheery saint of Christmas to Holland :) .

So for my first giveaway I thought Sinterklaas would be a nice theme!! I will send the winner a package containing some typical treats for Sinterklaas:

a chocolate letter by the Dutch brand Droste in a letter of their choice;

a bag of pepernoten or kruidnoten by the Dutch brand Bolletje. Pepernoten are typically Dutch spicy dough cookies. They have a cinnamony, spicy taste, and it's a tradition to throw them around the room, so your kids can collect them! Or you obviously can eat them straight out of the bag.

and whatever else I will find.....

By now you are probably woundering what you have to do to become the lucky winner?? Leave me a comment on what you think of the Dutch feast of Sinterklaas and ofcourse let me know what letter you would like to receive if you won!

The deadline of this giveaway is 10 pm on the 20th of November (European Time), so be sure to post your comment before that time!!

donderdag 13 november 2008

So today is another great day of the week: Thursday! That means it's time for Craving Ellie in My Belly. There has been a change at CEiMB: Leigh didn't have enough time to host CEiMB anymore, so Natalie stepped up to take over: thanks!! If ever you need any help what so ever: please email me!!! (I'm serious: do email me!) This means we have a new website, so check it out here and if you like what you see and would like to join in, please do!! We would love to cook with you! All you need is a copy of the book Food You Crave by Ellie Krieger and the willingness to cook with us for at least 2 out of 4 weeks.

So this week it was my turn to pick something delicious and healty for us all to cook and boy was it difficult to choose! There are so many great recipes in this book, but eventually I settled on Portobello Lasagna Rollups with Easy Tomato Sauce from pages 152 and 153.

Why did I pick this recipe? Well.... first of all I love pasta, second of all I love tomato sauce, third of all I love mushrooms and last but not least: the idea of rolling up lasagna started to intrigue me. I never thought of rolling up lasagna before in my life!!! Ow and did I already mention we also had to make the sauce?? So it was two recipes for the price of one!

The recipe serves six, because that is way too much for little old me I halved the recipe for the lasagna to 3 portions of 2 rollups. Somehow I managed to make 7..... Very strange!! I did make the whole recipe for the tomato sauce and used it all.... I also forgot to half the ammount of cheese....

I bought some fresh Lasagna sheets at the supermarket. I wouldn't need to cook them and should be able to roll them up immediately according to the packaging. Easy peasy, right?? Absolutely not!!! The lasagna sheet did roll up, but since it was a tad dry and the filling was warm it soon started to break.... :( I only found this out after I already rolled up the first two sheets. In the picture above it's pretty clear which ones I messed up......

So after that I just popped the sheets in boiling water for a minute or two and that seemed to work. Into the oven and voila: beautiful and tasty lasagna rollups! I absolutely loved these and will most definetely be making them again!! And soon too!!! I may use a bit more salt and pepper then though...

I can't wait to see what the Ellionisas thought of my pick, if you're also curious: look here.

Easy Tomato Sauce

(makes 3 cups, serving size 1/2 cup)

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 medium onion, finely chopped (about 1 1/2 cups) I used red onions

2 cloves garlic, minced (about 2 teaspoons)

Two 28-ounce cans whole tomatoes, drained and the tomatoes chopped

3 tablespoons tomato paste

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 bay leaf

Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

In a large saucepan, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring a few times, until softened, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute more. Add the remaining ingredients and cook, uncoverd, stirring occasionally, until thickened, about 30 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.Cook the noodles according to the package directions. Drain well and spread them out on a sheet of aluminum foil or waxed paper to prevent them from sticking.

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the mushrooms and cook, stirring occasionally, until browned and all the liquid has evaporated, about 5 minutes. Season with 1/4 teaspoon of the salt, stir in 1,5 cups of the tomato sauce, and simmer for two minutes.

In a medium bowl, combine the ricotta, spinach, egg, the remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt, a few turns of pepper, and the nutmeg.

Spread 1 cup of the remaining tomato sauce on the bottom of a 9 x 13-inch baking dish. Spread out about 2 tablespoons of the ricotta mixture onto a lasagna noodle. Top with about 1,5 tablespoons of the mushroom mixture, then roll up the noodle and stand it up or lay it down in the baking dish. Repeat with remaining noodles, ricotta mixture, and mushroom mixture. Spread the remaining 1,5 cups tomato sauce over the lasagna rolls. Top with the Parmesan and mozzarella, cover loosely with foil, and bake for 45 minutes. Uncover and bake for 15 minutes more.

Up next for CEiMB are two great picks, I'm already looking forward to both of them:Oven-Fried Chicken, page 213 for November 20th, hosted by Lonely SidecarMacaroni and Four Cheeses, page 168 for November 27th, hosted by Supplicious

dinsdag 11 november 2008

Another week, another Tuesday: time for sweets!! I must say that Tuesday has become my favourite day of the week since I joined TWD. This week we all baked Kugelhopf (pages 61-63 of Baking: From my Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan). This recipe was picked by Yolanda of The All-Purpose Girl and can be found here.

I started off deciding I would make miniature bundtcakes: I couldn't find a Kugelhopf-pan here Then I used 1/6 cup of raisins and 1/6 cup of cranberries and let them sit in 1/3 cup of cinnamon liquor over night. I also used some cinnamon-sugar I had leftover instead of the regular sugar.

Since I don't own a stand-mixer (still at the top of my wish-list, but I don't Santa will be that generous this year) I had to mix this with my hand-held mixer..... Unfortunately there was no way the dough wanted to climb up the hook...,. After 20 minutes my mixer started to get really warm and I called it quits.

I added the raisins and cranberries to half of the dough and 1/3 cup of mini chocolate chips to the other half. The first rising didn't take long: about 75 minutes instead of the 90 minutes indicated. After deflating the dough I popped them into the fridge overnight.

The second rise only needed about two hours. Then I baked them for 10 minutes, covered them loosely with foil and baked for another ten minutes. They even continued rising while baking.... I must have done something right!!

My kitchen smells delicious: cinnamon is divine to bake with, but so is chocolate!! Yum... Now for the taste of the miniature Kugelhopf..... The chocolate one was a bit dry to my taste and could have used a bit more flavour/sweetnes, but it was still delicious. The raisin/cranberry Kugelhopf was amazing: nice and moist and a hint of cinnamon.

However I don't know if I'll be making Kugelhopf again: I found the whole process to be quite time-consuming! Be sure to check out what the other TWD-ers cooked up this week!!

maandag 10 november 2008

Browsing through all the different blogs I found something interesting: there are people within the blog-community that make awards and give them to bloggers that they find inspirational. I thought this was so kind and such a great idea!

There are a lot of different awards out there and although I wished to receive one, I never expected it to happen so soon!! After all I only started blogging towards the end of July this year...

I met Shelby of The Life and Loves of Grumpy's Honeybunch through Tuesdays with Dorie. She always find interesting ingredients to cook up different dishes and participates in a lot of blo-events. Shelby was sweet enough to honour me with the Excellent Award. Thank you so much!!

However with every award come responsibilities: there are rules attached to them..... For the Excellent Award they are: Please find 5 blogs, of any kind that you love to read. Write a post about the blogs you picked, linking back to them. Make sure you let them know you gave them an award.

Since I read a lot of blogs on a regular basis, I had trouble narrowing my choice to only five... But I managed to do so eventually:

Kim of Scrumptious Photography: I know Kim through Tuesdays with Dorie. Kims blog does her name justice: beautiful photographs of scrumptious food.

Clara of I heart food 4 thoughts: I met Clare through Tuesday with Dorie and she introduced me to Craving Ellie in My Belly. She writes with such humour that I always get a smile on my face when I read her posts.

Liz of Cake or Death: Liz I also know through Tuesdays with Dorie, besides TWD she makes lots of other sweet treats that always look amazing and are very inspiring!

Jen of Cake Wrecks: I don't know Jen personally, I just stumbled upon Cake Wrecks one day and found it hilarous: now I visit every day. Jen posts every day, most days it's about one or several cake wrecks and on Sunday she posts about the most beautiful, amazing cakes one could ever imagine.

zondag 9 november 2008

So this weekend I went out and spoiled myself to congratulate myself on landing my first assignment. (a girl has to figure out something if she doesn't have a boyfriend/husband to spoil her.....) I must say I'm pretty pleased with myself: in total I only spent € 17,96 ($21,47)! Here's what I bought:

A caketester topped with a cupcake, isn't it adorable?? It costed only € 0,69!! I simply had to buy it! A muffin-box to take a muffin with me to work: this way it won't be squashed between books and notebooks! Only € 0,79.

Silicone muffin/cupcake shapes: heartshape and stareshape. € 1,99 per six, so a total of € 3,98.

A picture of a cup of coffee to hang on one of the kitchen walls: now I just have to phone my dad to make sure it gets on the wall! € 3,99

My biggest expense was this cookie press & icing set for € 12,50: I thought it would be so practical!! Now I can decorate cakes to be a bit more professional-looking! :)